1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates generally to computer networks, and, more particularly, to remote updating of printer settings on a client device in a networked environment.
2. Related Art
A typical computer network environment includes one or more servers and a plurality of client devices (computers). The client devices are typically configured to print documents via printers that are connected to the network through a print server. The client devices typically access the printers through print shares stored on a print server. Print shares are shared folders that allow print jobs to be queued to a print spooler that forwards the print jobs to the associated printer. Sometimes it is necessary to replace a print server through which printers are accessible through the network with another print server. In such cases, some or all of the printers that were formerly accessible through the old print server must now be accessed through the new print server. This is typically referred to as migrating the print shares from the old print server to the new print server.
In order for a client device to print through the new print server, however, the printer settings on the client device must be modified to reflect the migrated print shares. This is generally the responsibility of a system administrator. The system administrator typically manually modifies the printer settings for each client device in the system by going to the location of each client device and manually adding the printer settings that correspond to the new print server, and deleting the printer settings that correspond to the old print server. Unfortunately, depending on the size of the network and the proximity of the client devices to the system administrator, this can be a tedious and time consuming process.
Therefore, there is a need for overcoming the deficiencies and inadequacies stated above.